Washington State Will Debate Easing Three Strikes

By |February 9, 2005

Some legislators in Washington State, which started the “three strikes and you’re out” movement in 1993, want to ease the law by giving less-violent criminals the chance to walk free some day, says the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. Under the proposal, inmates whose three “strike” convictions don’t include any Class A felonies –the most serious crimes under state law — would be able to ask for release after serving 15 years. “At some point, when a guy is well past his prime and has served a good long time,” says Sen. Adam Kline, “You have to consider whether keeping him in jail is worth the expense.”

Of about 200 prisoners who have been given life sentences under the three strikes law, 38 have no Class A felony convictions and would be eligible — starting with six of them in 2010 — to ask for release under the proposal. Prosecutors would not support removing second-degree robbery, an idea that would immediately free about 50 three-strike prisoners and release almost 40 more as they complete the standard sentences for their most recent strikes. Russ Hauge, president of the Washington Association of Prosecuting Attorneys, said taking second-degree robbery off the list “goes too far away from the intent” of the 11-year-old voter-approved three strikes initiative.

The legislation marks a major change for Republicans, who long hve embraced a law-and-order rallying cry. Now many GOP senators argue for rehabilitating more offenders rather than long-time incarceration.

An Arizona doctor argues that the government should have learned from previous federal anti-drug strategies that blanket prohibition doesn’t work. He calls for scrapping attempts to curtail opioids and replacing it with “harm reduction” policies.

Expensive medications for inmates can lead to substandard care and delays in treatment, and that may have lasting—even deadly—consequences for incarcerated individuals, writes a prison health care advocate.

Murder rates in the nation’s 30 largest cities are projected to fall by nearly 6 percent this year according to the latest data, undercutting claims that the nation is experiencing a “crime wave,” says the Brennan Center for Justice at the New York University School of Law.

School safety commission proposes ending a federal guideline telling schools not to punish minorities at higher rates. The panel largely sidestepped issues relating to guns, although it favors arming some school personnel.